The Critical Importance Of Having A Customised Panelist Website

Engagement on the internet is challenging, with all of the various opportunities and stimuli competing for our attention.  A wide variety of techniques and tools are being used, and those who build and maintain custom panels/research communities should take note and also apply these best practices as much as possible.

Whilst it is unrealistic (and in most cases undesirable) to think or expect that a custom panel/research community is going to be a daily priority for its members, it is important that members can recall, and are reminded that they are a part of this research community and most important that they respond to the various survey and qualitative research invites as these are received.  This means that their impressions of this membership experience should be positive, professional and in general engaging enough to maintain their interest and make them feel valued as members.

With the main communication device  for panel owners being the panelist website where members are reminded of this relationship and can obtain information and interact with its content, having a customised panelist website tailored to the particular brand or category of interest is critical.

Some of the elements that should be included in a customised panelist website are:

• Custom Look & Feel - where the logo, style, colours and branding are consistent with the brand or category of interest
• Clear Call To Action – whether it is to join the panel or to login to update one’s profile information or check on incentives earned for their participation
• Quick Poll - where a member can provide an answer to a closed end question and immediately see how this answer compares with the answers of other members who have completed it
• News - members are interested in reading news items that are relevant to the brand or category and expect this information to be easily accessible within this environment
• Results - for both BtoB and BtoC panels, the sharing of results in order to demonstrate what insights are gained by their participation should be both interesting and rewarding to its members
• FAQs - these should be specific to the types of queries likely to occur across a host of different aspects of the relationship including who owns the panel, who operates the panel, how incentives are earned and redeemed, etc.
• Contact Us - often times, members will not want to take the time to review the FAQs or these will not have specifically addressed a question or concern they might have and will then want to use this information to get a response quickly and effectively
• Custom Pages & Elements - each panel and its website are different, depending on the audience plus the type of research that will be conducted with them, so there should be custom pages and elements specific to these needs.  For example, we recently built a chef’s panel for Premier Foods and the panelist website contains a “Chef’s Kitchen” page comprised of tips and advice from a professional chef, and a “Recipes” page containing a large and searchable database of recipes that could be downloaded and utilised by members.

Maintaining a high level of interest and engagement begins with having a well thought out customised  panelist website.  There are also other best practices worth mentioning related to the length of surveys, the way in which these questions are asked (i.e., interactivity) and the like but I will save this for another blog post.

The Case Against Ring-Fencing An Access Panel

I recently met with a Research Director at a major global pharmaceutical company in New York who told me that he had been approached by several access panel companies who were offering to profile their panels specifically for his needs.  In so doing, these access panel companies would be able to more easily and presumably more cost effectively target research to those consumers who would have pre-identified as qualifying for this client’s research.  This Research Director asked my opinion of this approach and how it differed from what we were discussing, that is for EasyInsites to build a custom panel/research community specifically created for and owned by this client.  In thinking back to this conversation and my answer to his question, I thought this might be a question that other clients have asked themselves.  The following is a recap of my response.

Profiling an access panel, or what is sometimes referred to as “ring-fencing”, simply means that additional information has been collected on those panelists that enable the access panel company to more easily and more cost effectively find those consumers who a client needs for their research.  This makes a project that would otherwise be very expensive and maybe impossible due to a very low incidence become affordable and feasible.  However, the benefits stop there.

In contrast, having a custom panel built specifically for this client’s needs means:

• Having complete control over how many panelists have been recruited and profiled and how often they are participating in research.  With an access panel, a client’s ring-fenced panelists are still being used for other research projects.
• The registration/profiling survey in a custom panel is specifically designed to meet the client’s needs, with each and every question asked in the way the client desires.  With an access panel, the client at best is able to specify a few questions and often times even those are not structured in exactly the way the client desires.
• The custom panel has its own custom panel website with engagement features and benefits specifically designed for this particular client’s needs with an understanding and sensitivity to what works best with this particular target audience.  With an access panel, these panelists continue to be members of the access panel and receive whatever website information and incentive programme offered to this very general and large audience.
• With a custom panel owned by the client, there is no CPI (cost per interview) charge whatsoever when the client wants to interact with their panelists.  The only charge is for incentives which need to be paid to the panelist, the amount depending on the length of the interview or the task.  With access panels, there will always be a charge.
• When EasyInsites builds a custom panel for a client, we provide the option for that panel to be opened on the Cint Panel Exchange.  In so doing, our client can realise a revenue share when researchers purchase access to their panelists with whatever restrictions on usage our client requires.  With access panels, they would not provide a revenue share because the client does not own those panelists even if some profiling has been done on their behalf.
• One of the great benefits of a client having their own custom panel is to build a proprietary research asset which can provide a competitive advantage, as well as provide an opportunity to broadcast this to the marketplace and benefit from the PR attention this can garner.  With a ring-fenced panel within an access panel, it simply does not provide enough of a unique proposition to realise these benefits.
• The cost savings when having your own custom panel are substantial.   With access panels, a client pays each and every time they want to conduct research with the panelists and this is on-going and serves as a disincentive for conducting more research.

I look forward to any thoughts you might have on this topic, please post them here.

Why Are We Trying To Create New Communities For Market Research Purposes?

I presented a paper earlier this week at the ESOMAR Online Conference in Berlin.  Below is a brief extract from it.   For more information and to purchase a copy of the complete paper, please contact ESOMAR.

There is currently considerable discussion and debate at market research conferences and online on market research forums, blogs, Twitter and the like regarding custom panels and communities.  Several themes and strongly held opinions emerge when examining this dialogue, including:

• Market researchers should be taking the lead in creating online communities to help brands get closer to their consumers and gain insights to better manage and grow these brands. The loudest voice here argues that market researchers are best suited to take the initiative because of their experience with insights and awareness of how best to listen to and interpret what consumers are saying, as well noting these communities touch all parts of the business so someone in the organisation needs to take the lead so why not the market research department. A minority voice argues that market researchers are not necessarily best positioned for this and that the appropriate place out of which the initiative should be driven is the Marketing Department.
• Online communities which are designed for market research only should be created to enable the opportunity to view and interpret the uninterrupted voice and exchange of ideas amongst consumers. The argument here is that these communities need to be constructed by the company in order for these dialogues to occur and be heard. The counter argument points to the vast array of online communities that already exist across various social media platforms such as Facebook, MySpace, and many others and asks why the company would need to construct (and fund) another community when there are already so many in existence from which to listen and learn.
• There are major differences between an online community and an online custom panel. Some argue that online custom panels are commonplace and something of the past, and do not enable theopportunity for uninterrupted conversations between and amongst consumers. This perspective suggests that online custom panels are somehow less useful than an online community. Another perspective is that online custom panels are not yet widely adopted and do not naturally occur and that these panels deliver substantial and clearly identifiable benefits to the companies who have them. Still others argue that both have their place, and they serve different purposes.

This paper seeks to explore these varying points of view and to shed light on the topic both through a detailed assessment of the research that has been published to date as well as a detailed examination of one company’s experience.